New police chief Steve Conrad sets lofty goal for Louisville and its officers

He sounds very promising. I like the fact that he is looking to the actual police officers for solutions. He also sounds like he will be a leader for the department instead of a public mouthpiece. It is time for everyone on the department to stop griping and start suggesting improvements and solutions.

Since he plans on retiring here, maybe that will give Yvette Gentry the push she needs to look for a job elsewhere.

He wasn't my first choice but I am cautiously optimistic. Welcome back to Louisville Conrad.

Before Chief Conrad left here to go to Glendale, I would occassionally run in to him as an officer. First impressions are everything and I gotta tell you, this is a very good man. I have never detected any negative vibes or snake tendencies from him. He is going to do what is right. You just have to trust that someone with that much time in this business knows what that "right" is. Gentry was my choice, but she didn't get it. OK, I'm moving on and supporting the new chief.

His rhetoric seems promising ---- as was mentioned before, hopefully he is willing to listen to people lower than LT.... it did say he would be talking with officers so maybe the Lt's survey is just to help the discussion.... give it a starting point... Optimism people... optimism. He also wants to have a better relationship with officers... (ideally he realizes axing take home cars is not a springboard for that)

(On a side note how in the world did you find yourself pushing for YG? personal feelings aside, her track record aside, where did she even begin to compete with the other candidates at this level ? just a curiosity)

Can we now loose the hats at roll call?

Quote from USA today not the liberal CJ, gallop survey says Obama's tenure as president is a failure his rating is 50% -44% lower than every nominee in the last five presidential contests with the exception of Bob Dole in 96. So let's not say how great a president he's been. The only thing I see with Conrad is he asked the upper command to stay in their positions. I think this was a grave Mistake. He should have came in and talked to everyone and looked at what is going on now before keeping anyone. I figure some things were cut and dried by the mayor before he was given the job and he may not of had any say so in it. If this structure stays as is it will be the same old RCW way of doing business and nothing will change. Polling lt's and above about problems, what a joke, most don't even come in and work a full day and if they do it's out of their office. Chief the people that know what is going on are on the streets not reading e-mail all day long locked.. in a office. Come out to the divisions and talk one on one with your beat officers or ride a shift with them then you will know what the problems are and get a gameplan going. Morale on this dept is shot and you need to know why. Your chief so one good gesture would be to get rid of formal rollcalls everyday that was brought on by grudge holding Gentry over one officers mistake.

if you don't believe me, look at this

From the glendal arizona pd website

http://www.glendaleaz.com/police/documents/AnnualReport2008Final.pdf

"The utilization of "zone" deployment enabled significant reduction

in response times to all calls for service. Under zone deployment,

patrol officers are assigned on one of four patrol zones. Sergeants

work with patrol officers to manage calls for service in their zones.

This approach facilitates problem solving, provides a concentration

of personnel in neighborhoods experiencing higher crime level, and

allows flexibility in deploying patrol resources to address emerging

crime trends. This approach has reduced response times and

increased officer safety."

I am guessing the other "virtually" {not cooridinated, organized or properly led} waste of manpower efforts will continue.

On a side note, Glendale only had about 400 officers and a much smaller command structure. Maybe he will choose to lessen the number of "senior" commanders (i.e. majors and above) to a more manageable amount.

to Chief Conrad.

Sir,

If you do not get rid of Gentry and the like, you will have ZERO credibility with your officers. PERIOD.

This is your department now, run it like you need to.

backs

AAAASSS FREAKIN HERITAGE AWARENESS RETARDED MONTH.

WHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Time for a contract and a raise, I am tired of "skin in the game". They complain about police overtime-did u see the firefighters OT? Not knocking firefighters but give us a break. More importantly speedy recovery to the officer that was shot-great job out there Brother-

& here's hoping for no more stolen Hondas!

A comment from a Glendale officer:

"Well, our problem is now your problem. That sounds dramatic, he wasn't a terrible Chief, but he wasn't great. We all figured he was preparing to leave even before the LMPD job opened, he short sold his house and his wife never liked Glendale.

Pros: Conrad is into proactive policing, he created (recreated really) some proactive street crime squads, one of which I have been with for 4 years. Be ready for serious COMPSTAT if you aren't already using it. He is a really nice guy, always friendly and will talk to you after he shakes your hand. When facing a budget shortfall, he made significant cuts, including furlough days for command staff, to avoid laying off even civilian employees.

Cons: Definately an admin type. To hear his police history, he wasn't a street cop for long. He beefed up his upper staff and added civilian management at "Lieutenant" levels. He CANNOT take criticism. We had a Lieutenant test recently where he personally hired an out of agency Lt, bypassing all our own guys. Shortly after, he came to briefings and when asked why he went out of agency, there was a red faced blowup. He decided he was going to change our policy of having a work day to a work week, then told us we had to flex off overtime (illegal and he was quite upset when our union called him on the carpet). I will think of some more later.

All in all, I would say he probably won't be an agency wrecker, but he isn't a strong leader, he looks like a soup sandwich and we are glad to have him head home...wish he would take the Executive Asst Chief with him."

Louisville has always been 25 years behind in the police dept. Probably many more years behind depts our size... It's 2012 and every marked car still don't have MDT'S... Depts our size had them in the 80's.... we should catch up in 2025.... We are not even prepared to handle 25 protesters...The Officers, no fault of their own were lost, ill prepared which is typical of LMPD.

Phil Turner was part of the SPI selection committee when Chief White was selected. He was then immediately given an Asst Chief position. Just a prediction, but I will assume Shain will replace Gentry.